It Starts With a Dream
by Sunsetter Nymphetamine
Summary: Jack Frost has a nightmare in which the other Guardians accuse him of a crime he did not commit, planting a seed of doubt in his head as to whether they will ever fully accept him.


Drabble written for a friend. Figured I'd post it.

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Jack slammed backwards, skittering, trying and failing to get his feet under him. "North!" he wheezed, grabbing out and reaching for his staff, lodged in between cracked cobblestones, stuck fast even as he pulled at it, his bruised and screaming back wrenching from the strain. "North, please! Listen to me! It wasn't , me, it wasn't—"

"Wasn't it, Jack?" North thundered, knocking the staff to the side with a powerful swing of his arm. Only the top half of the staff flew through the air at the blow; the bottom half remained firmly lodged in the stones of the little street in the crumbling tourist trap in south France.

"No one but you could have done this, Jack," Bunnymund said accusingly, leaping forward to stand next to North, his full height and rugged appearance seeming to ooze with the fury that his bared teeth and narrowed eyes emanated, rage directed at Jack. He hopped forward and leaned down, pushing Jack even further into the wall. "No one else could cause an ice slick in south France in August, Jack. Thirteen people killed in that crash! Thirteen! This is beyond your little games—there were children on that bus, murderer!"

"Bunny, _please,_"Jack groaned, pushing at the guardian, who seemed to be made of stone, for all the good it did. "It wasn't me, I swear! I wasn't even in France, I was in Argentina—"

"Then what are you doing here now?" Toothiana demanded, rising up from behind North as Sandman landed next to the enormous guardian. Jack was well and truly surrounded. "A bus crashes after slipping on ice in the middle of August, and we find _you_ here, flitting away having fun while people are dying. What sort of monster are you? You're not a guardian, you're a killer!"

-_They'll never believe you.-_

"I don't have an explanation for you!" Jack cried, throwing his arm up pitifully as North raised an enormous fist over him. "Please, guys, I don't know what happened, but it wasn't me! I would never do something so stupid, I know where I can and can't bring winter weather and I wouldn't violate my own rules by doing something this reckless! You have to believe me!" he pleaded, curling up in on himself.

Sandy placed a hand on North's arm, shaking his head warningly at the large guardian. Jack's spirits rose, thinking for a split second that he had an ally in Sandy, but his hopes were dashed when the sandman gave him a glance, one that read rage and betrayal and sadness, all in a single look.

_ -They will never trust you-_

"I knew you weren't fit to be a guardian, Jack," Bunny declared, trembling angrily. He reached out with a powerful paw and grabbed Jack's hair, wrenching his head up, forcing the boy to meet his hate-filled eyes. "I knew you weren't the sort to protect the kids. I knew your carelessness would get the best of you, and I was right! Look at you now!"

Jack opened his mouth to beg, but the other guardians were gone, and he was falling, spiraling out of control through pure darkness. He struggled to summon up some snow, some ice, something that he could use to latch onto a surface and stop his descent, but his powers stubbornly refused to manifest.

_-You will never be their equal. They will never see you as one of them. All they will ever see is a man half-grown, without the innocence of a child or the responsibility of an adult. They will always turn to you as scapegoat, use you when it is convenient and abandon you when it suits them. Do you really belong with such lost, arrogant creatures, Jack? They have always fit in, never been excluded, never been disbelieved. But you—where could you possibly stand among them?-_

Jack bolted upright with a cry, sweat beading his cold forehead, icy even for his typically cold skin. "Just a dream," he whispered, looking at his intact staff, lying next to him on top of the snow bank where he had made his bed. "Just a dream. It didn't really happen. It won't really happen."

_-Oh, but won't it, Jack?-_


End file.
